642 REPORT—1904. 
very centre of individual morality and health, and, as such, is a direct condition 
of the efficiency of labour. It is far too little realised that a sanitary and comfort- 
able house among quiet neighbours has a ‘productive value,’ and is, quite 
definitely, one of the factors of wage-earning ; in other words, a good house, as 
compared with a slum, brings with it the possibility of paying a higher rent for it. 
The point which specially suggests municipal building and owning is that muni- 
cipal control over certain classes of house—control even violating the sanctity of 
the Englishman’s castle—is necessary in these interests. We have in Glasgow 
20,000 houses whose doors must open at any hour of the night at the knock of 
the sanitary inspectors. In a city every house is either a centre of good influence 
or of contamination material and moral, and, the more closely houses are 
packed, the more definite the need of positive control and regulation. Such 
control obviously would be most effective in the hands of a Municipality that 
owned the houses. In view, then, of the actual circumstances of slum life which 
prevail in every large city, and in view of the hopelessness of escape on the part of 
the low-paid wage-earner from such contagious influences, there seems prima facte 
a strong case for the provision of at least one- and two-roomed houses by an 
agency which would aim primarily at affording to the tenants the conditions of 
health, morality, and efficiency, not only in the construction of the houses, but in 
their continued administration and control. I have always held that the owning 
of poor-class property carries with it a moral responsibility which is not escaped 
by the owner shutting his eyes and leaving the administration to his factor; and, 
on similar grounds, much might be said for a Municipality owning and letting all 
the small houses within its area. This would at least secure a ‘clean city.’ 
Such a position, then, is quite intelligible as a counsel of perfection, and it 
might be worth consideration in the case of a city planned, like a garden city, 
from the beginning. But, in the actual circumstances of our cities, | mention it 
merely to bring out my point. For there is no proposal before any Municipality 
of to-day of taking over and making a monopoly of the supply of small houses, 
or even of building all the small houses in the future. The utmost that has been 
proposed is the building and letting of a limited number of such houses in direct 
rivalry with private builders and owners. And the question which must be 
answered is: On what principle, or with what view, is this limited proposal 
made ? 
If it were to afford an experiment, and an object-lesson, as was done with 
the happiest results in the case of the Corporation lodging-houses in Glasgow, 
where the rise in the standard not only swept out the old and very objectionable 
lodging-houses, but led to the large increase of private ‘models’ competing success- 
fully with the municipal ones, there would probably be nothing but approval. 
It seems a legitimate use of public money to make public experiments which 
would otherwise not be made, so long as it is recognised that experiments which 
fail should be given up. But if the proposal is made in the full recognition 
that such an experiment is not an object-lesson, inasmuch as it cannot be followea 
by private enterprise ; if the reason given for it is that a certain class of tenants 
cannot pay the rent which private enterprise must have if it is to continue 
its supply, and that the Municipality, as having command of capital at a very 
low rate of interest, can afford to undersell the market rents without coming 
on the rates, the matter is put on an entirely different basis. The attractiveness 
of a ‘clean city’ is one thing; the attractiveness of low rents is another. 
Let us look for a moment at the principles on which certain services are set 
aside for the Government to perform. The great mass of the national income is 
produced by individuals of the community dividing their labour and selling their 
products to each other, competing with each other as producers to serve the whole 
body of themselves as consumers. But there are two great classes of services 
which are not left to individual competition. (1) External defence, justice, police, 
poor relief, &c., are given over to the Government, the expenses being covered by 
taxation. The principle of payment is ability, or, more philosophically, equi- 
marginal sacrifice, on the old Platoaic principle that the best state is that which 
is likest the individual, and that the citizen should pay to the national house- 
